Daisy Ridley Is Excited To Return, As ‘Star Wars’ Films ”Bring a Lot of Joy to a Lot of People”
This past Sunday marked the one-year anniversary of the Star Wars Celebration 2023 announcement that Daisy Ridley would be reprising her role as Rey Skywalker in the upcoming New Jedi Order film from director Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy. The actress recently sat down with Empire Magazine for a career-spanning interview, and naturally, one of the topics that came up was the new Star Wars movie.
It’s not the first time she comments on this, but Ridley basically said that while she was a baby when filming the sequel trilogy, particularly on the set of The Force Awakens, she’s now the adult in the room:
“I suppose I feel more like I’m owning it. I suppose I owned it the first time. Basically, I’m an adult now. I certainly did not feel like an adult at the time. Obviously, personally, things have changed, and professionally, I’ve had lots of other experiences, and so I definitely feel like it’s a different thing this time.”
Ridley has been living in the indie world for a couple of years now. Most recently, her starring vehicle Sometimes I Think About Dying quietly opened in theaters in January, while her last film, Magpie, premiered at the South By Southwest Film Festival. Her next project out is Young Woman and the Sea, about the first woman who swam across the English Channel, and she just shot Martin Campbell’s Cleaner and Zak Hilditch’s We Bury the Dead.
And yet, even taking into account all of the drama that surrounded her movies, Star Wars still has a very special place in her heart:
“There’s just a lot of joy with me and these films. Honestly, if I wasn’t excited, I wouldn’t have done it. It feels like a great thing to be a part of.
“It wasn’t a difficult decision [coming back]. I didn’t say yes right away, Kathy [Kennedy] was like, ‘Take as long as you need.’ Why wouldn’t I [do it]? Yes, they have been divisive, but also they bring a lot of love and joy to a lot of people.
It feels pretty amazing to be able to continue a character – like, can I even remember how to play her? It’s an interesting challenge as an actor to come back to something and try to figure out what’s changed for me and what’s changed for her.”
Later this month will be the 10-year anniversary of the cast announcement of The Force Awakens, where the name of Daisy Ridley was first presented to the fanbase and the picture of the entire cast and crew from the table read was published online. The new film, tentatively titled New Jedi Order, is in the early stages of pre-production.
Earlier this year, when the interview was conducted, Ridley hadn’t read a script yet, but was about to. There have been some rumors about casting being underway, though the production schedule is still unknown. They will be filming either later this year or early 2025, Ridley confirmed in a past interview, too. Lucasfilm’s focus at the moment is on The Mandalorian & Grogu, which goes up this June in California. That movie has landed a May 22, 2026, release date. New Jedi Order is, at the moment, likely to get the Dec. 18, 2026, spot.
Stay tuned as this continues to develop. Disney is presenting its future slate of movies at CinemaCon this Thursday, where news could come out.
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as movies from Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
